Father Charles Coughlin: The Grandfather Of Hate Radio

A lot has been said lately about the state of talkradio – the overwhelming presence of hate, lies, threats and hysteria. Everyone thinks its a phenomenon of the past twenty years. Sadly, no.

Hate radio has its roots back to the beginnings of radio. Although not the only one who used the airwaves to preach hate, fear and prejudice, Father Charles Coughlin was probably the most famous practitioner of extreme right wing sentiment. At his peak, his one hour “sermons” had an audience of several million and were a Sunday night staple on CBS Radio at first, and later NBC before his decline and eventual demise.

Coughlin established the template for what is the basis of Hate radio today. Although to be fair, Coughlin was articulate and had style – something todays practitioners have no clue how to use.

The excerpt here is from a broadcast of July 30, 1939 in a talk called “The Christian Front versus the Popular Front”.

“In the meantime, if you care to carry on, you have the discomfort of knowing of your past failures. In the meantime if you do not emulate the traditions of your European comrades, who ran like rats for safety, leaving behind their disillusioned followers to bear the brunt of defeat, you will be responsible for building up such a defense mechanism as this world never witnessed. A defense mechanism which will either isolate you or obliterate you if you persist in pursuing your attacks against religion and constitutional Americanism.”

One Response

[…] 2010 radio program, Beck went even lower, conflating real Catholic social justice with the bigoted Rev. Charles Coughlin, which was a thinly veiled effort to equate the social justice teaching of the Church with fascism. […]

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